• Politics Large families threaten to take to the streets against the Government: "If Belarra's law prospers, we will disobey it"
  • Justice The CGPJ warns that the 20 types of family contemplated by the Belarra law do not fit into the Constitution

It has been one of the slowest rules of the entire legislature and that has generated more tensions in recent times in the heart of the Government, but at last it sees the light. The new Family Law, approved on Tuesday by the Council of Ministers, is one of the great milestones for the Ministry of Social Rights, commanded by the leader of Podemos, Ione Belarra, which seeks to "expand" the rights of families and recognize the "diversity" that today defines the idea of family.

"The concept of family is not limited to families of marital origin," says the text of the law, approved in the Council of Ministers in the second round and which now lines the path of parliamentary processing. Thus, the norm has been designed as a "response" to the social reality of our country, with the aim of "ensuring equal rights for different types of family and the protection of family diversity" through new permits, equalizations or the elimination of concepts such as "large family", which is now included in a new category. called "Families with Greater Parenting Support Needs," along with other cases.

Twenty types of families

The norm recognizes the existence of numerous family models beyond the traditional ones of marital origin. The CGPJ, as reported on Tuesday by EL MUNDO, figures in 20 different types and warns the Government that they can generate "confusion, legal insecurity and inequality" by overlapping certain cases and "exceeding the constitutional framework".

The count made by the Judiciary, based on the text of the Belarra law, includes two-parent, single-parent or single-parent families, young people (under 29 years of age), homomarital or homoparental LGTBI, families with greater needs for support for upbringing (current large families), families in which there is only one parent, families in which there are people with disabilities and / or in a situation of dependency, multiple families (in which there are births, adoptions or multiple fostering), families in which adoptions or fosterings occur, or reconstituted families (with children from previous relationships).

Also families residing in rural areas, immigrant families, transnational families, intercultural families, families abroad, returned families, families in vulnerable situations, single people, people united in marriage, or de facto couples.

"People must be able to form the families they choose, if they want to do it, and they must choose with whom they want to share their lives. And the institutions will be there to accompany them, to protect them and to support them," said Minister Belarra.

Equalization of unmarried couples

The redefinition of family types is not the only novelty provided by the Social Rights norm. One of the great achievements of which Ione Belarra's department boasts is the equalization between marriages and de facto couples in terms of access to the 15 days of leave for registration that to date had only those who had contracted a marriage union.

With this measure, they highlight from the Executive, it is possible to "practically culminate" the equality between those people united by a marriage and de facto couples.

Five-day paid leave

Another advance represented by the approval of the law is the introduction of a paid leave of five days a year to care for relatives up to the second degree or cohabitants, which can be used in case of serious accident or illness, hospitalization or surgical intervention without hospitalization that needs rest.

There are other leaves: an eight-week parental leave is included, which can be taken continuously or discontinuously, full-time or part-time, until the child reaches the age of 8. This leave, in this case, is unpaid.

A third permit has also been designed, useful for cases of "force majeure", explains the ministry, to attend to a family member immediately, because, for example, of a sudden illness or an accident. It can be used for hours up to a total of four days a year.

Expansion of large families

One of the most controversial points of the law has been the elimination of the concept of large family and the inclusion of this category within a new one, baptized as "families with greater needs of support for parenting". A change of name that is not shared by large families, whose associations have already threatened to demonstrate against the rule.

With the approval of the text, single-parent families with two children will also be considered in this way. Also families with two children where an ascendant or descendant has a disability; families with two children headed by a victim of gender-based violence or by a spouse who has obtained sole custody without the right to maintenance, as well as families with two children in which one parent is in hospital treatment for one year or has been imprisoned.

In the same way, families that until now were considered numerous of general category as those with four children, instead of five as until now, will be considered "family with greater needs of support for the upbringing of special category". This range will also include those with three children in case of multiple births, instead of four as at present, and families with three children and low income – up to 150% of the Public Indicator of Income of Multiple Effects (Iprem).

Parenting income

On the other hand, the income upbringing expands to new situations. In this way, the aid of 100 euros per month will be guaranteed in a structural way to families with children up to three years old. The extension implemented by the Government includes all mothers who are receiving unemployment benefit, contributory or not. Also to those who, without meeting the requirements previously, contribute 30 days from delivery.

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  • Articles Vicente Coll